[ Monday, 4:00 PM - Somyung High School, The Back Gate ]
The dismissal bell rang, a shrill sound that signaled the end of the masquerade.
For eight hours a day, Kang Jin-woo wore the mask of a scholarship student. He sat in uncomfortable wooden chairs, listened to lectures on history he had already lived through, and ate cheap bread from the commissary while the children of Senators and Chaebols dined on catered sushi.
He walked toward the back gate, his footsteps echoing against the concrete walls.
The school was buzzing. The rumor of the "Black Porsche" from this morning had mutated into a legend. Some said he was a secret heir; others said he was a gigolo selling himself to a Gangnam heiress.
Jin-woo adjusted the strap of his black leather backpack. He didn't mind the rumors. Confusion was a form of camouflage. As long as they were guessing, they weren't looking at the truth: that the "penniless orphan" had just moved 85 Billion Won through the city's financial arteries before lunch period.
He stepped out of the school grounds and turned left, heading toward the quiet alleyway where he had arranged to meet his driver.
The alley was a narrow throat of asphalt between two brick buildings. The sun was blocked here, casting long, cold shadows. The air smelled of damp cardboard and old frying oil from the restaurants on the main street.
Jin-woo stopped.
The hair on the back of his neck stood up. It was a sensation he remembered from his past life—the primal warning system of a prey animal sensing a trap.
Thirty meters ahead, a black sedan was parked sideways, completely blocking the exit.
It wasn't a luxury car. It was a bruised, heavy-duty Hyundai saloon with tinted windows darker than the law allowed.
Three men were leaning against it.
They weren't high school bullies. They were professionals. Their suits were cheap polyester, straining at the shoulders not from gym muscles, but from the thick layers of fat and brawn that came from years of street fighting. They smoked cigarettes with a casual, bored arrogance.
One of them, a man with a jagged scar running down his neck like a lightning bolt, flicked his cigarette onto the pavement. He crushed it with the heel of his dress shoe.
[ SYSTEM ALERT: Hostile Entities Detected. ][ Scan Complete. ]
Target: Choi Su-chul (Alias: Viper).
Affiliation: Seven Star Gang (Enforcer).
Threat Level: High.
Weaponry: Concealed steel baton.
"Kang Jin-woo?" Viper asked. His voice sounded like gravel grinding in a mixer.
Jin-woo didn't flinch. He didn't step back. He simply adjusted his cuffs.
"Who's asking?"
"Someone who wants to know how a high school kid bought a subway station," Viper grinned, revealing teeth capped in gold. "Get in the car, kid. The Chairman wants to have a chat."
"I have a math tutor at 5:00," Jin-woo lied calmly. "I'm busy."
Viper laughed. It was a dry, hacking sound. "You think this is a request? Grab him."
The two thugs flanking the car pushed off the metal. They cracked their knuckles—a cliché, but an effective one. They were big, slow walls of meat, used to terrifying debtors and students who froze at the sight of a tattoo peeking out from a collar.
They expected Jin-woo to cower. They expected him to beg for his life.
They didn't expect the Predator to be hungry.
[ SYSTEM ANALYSIS: Host Physique is Level 1 (Teenager). ][ Strength Disadvantage: -40%. ][ Speed Advantage: +10%. ][ SUGGESTION: Run. Or purchase 'Basic CQC' Skill for 100 Points. ]
No, Jin-woo thought, his eyes turning cold and flat. I don't need a System to take out trash. I just need to be brutal.
Jin-woo dropped his leather Montblanc backpack. It hit the asphalt with a heavy thud.
As it landed, he moved.
He didn't retreat. He launched himself forward.
He stepped inside the guard of the thug on the left. The man was winding up for a haymaker—a wide, slow, arrogant swing meant to intimidate rather than injure. It was a rookie mistake.
Jin-woo didn't block. He ducked under the arm, grabbed the man's cheap polyester tie with both hands, and yanked his head down with every ounce of gravity he could summon. At the same moment, he drove his knee upward.
CRACK.
The sickening, wet sound of cartilage shattering echoed off the brick walls.
The thug didn't even scream. He just gagged, blood spraying from his ruined nose onto the pavement, and collapsed to his knees, clutching his face.
"You little—!" the second thug roared.
His hand went to his belt. A knife.
Jin-woo didn't wait to see the blade. He dropped into a crouch, grabbing a handful of loose gravel and cement dust from a construction pile next to the wall.
He threw it upward in a vicious arc.
"ARGH! My eyes!"
The second thug stumbled back, clawing at his face, blinded by the grit. He swung his fist blindly, hitting nothing but air.
Jin-woo stepped in. He grabbed the blinded man by the back of his hair and slammed his face into the side mirror of the black sedan.
SMASH.
The plastic housing exploded. The glass shattered. The man dropped like a sack of potatoes, unconscious before he hit the ground.
Four seconds. Two men down.
Jin-woo stood there, his chest heaving. His knuckles were throbbing with a dull, hot pain. He wasn't a soldier; he was an eighteen-year-old boy running on adrenaline and muscle memory from a past life of survival.
He looked at Viper.
Viper wasn't laughing anymore. The smirk had vanished, replaced by a look of genuine confusion and rising anger. He pulled a collapsible steel baton from his jacket pocket and flicked his wrist.
Click-clack.
The weapon extended, gleaming in the shadows.
"You..." Viper growled, his grip tightening on the handle until his knuckles turned white. "You're not a student. Who the hell are you?"
"I told you," Jin-woo said, stepping over the groaning body of the first thug. He wiped a speck of dust from his blazer. "I'm going to be late."
Viper snarled and charged.
He was faster than his lackeys. Much faster. He closed the distance in two strides, swinging the steel baton in a vicious horizontal arc aimed at Jin-woo's temple. If that connected, it wouldn't just hurt—it would kill.
Jin-woo saw it coming. The System highlighted the trajectory in a faint red line, but his body was too slow to dodge completely.
He ducked.
The baton whistled through the air, missing his skull by inches, but the tip grazed his shoulder.
Pain. A sharp, electric jolt shot down his arm.
Jin-woo gritted his teeth. He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out the only weapon he had.
A fountain pen. A heavy, metal Montblanc Meisterstück.
As Viper raised his arm for a second strike, Jin-woo drove the pen downward with all his strength.
He jammed it into the soft point of Viper's shoulder, right into the trapezius muscle where the nerves clustered.
"AAAGH!"
Viper screamed, his arm going numb. The steel baton clattered to the ground.
Jin-woo didn't stop. He kicked the back of Viper's knee, forcing the larger man to buckle. He grabbed the gangster by the throat and slammed him backward against the rough brick wall.
"Who sent you?" Jin-woo asked.
His voice wasn't loud. It was terrifyingly calm, devoid of any adrenaline or fear. It was the voice of a man conducting a business transaction.
Viper gasped for air, his eyes bulging. Blood trickled down his shirt where the pen was still embedded in his shoulder muscle.
"Fuck... you..."
Jin-woo pressed his thumb into the gangster's windpipe, cutting off the air supply.
"I asked a question. Was it Han Dong-soo? Or was it Chairman Choi?"
"No!" Viper choked out, clawing at Jin-woo's hand. "No! It was... the Chairman! Chairman Jang! He heard about the auction! He wants a cut!"
"A cut?" Jin-woo scoffed.
He released his grip abruptly. Viper slid down the wall, coughing and clutching his throat.
Jin-woo bent down and picked up the fallen steel baton. It was heavy, balanced for breaking bones.
"Tell Chairman Jang this," Jin-woo said, looking down at the bleeding enforcer. "I don't share."
He raised the baton.
Viper flinched, curling into a ball, covering his head with his hands. "Don't! Don't!"
SMASH.
Jin-woo brought the baton down—not on Viper, but on the windshield of the black sedan.
The safety glass shattered into a spiderweb of cracks.
SMASH.
He destroyed the driver's side headlight.
SMASH.
He dented the hood, swinging with a mechanical, rhythmic violence. He systematically wrecked the front of the car while the three gangsters watched in horror. This wasn't a fight anymore; it was a demolition.
Jin-woo tossed the baton onto the ruined hood of the car. It rolled off with a metallic clang.
He picked up his backpack, dusted it off, and slung it over one shoulder.
"And tell him," Jin-woo added, turning his back on them, "if he sends another dog to sniff around me, I won't break his car. I'll buy his building and evict him."
[ 4:15 PM - The Main Road ]
Jin-woo emerged from the alleyway, stepping back into the sunlight of the main street.
His adrenaline was crashing. His shoulder throbbed where the baton had grazed him, and his right hand felt like it was on fire. He looked down. His knuckles were split open, raw and bleeding.
A sleek, two-tone silver and black Maybach GLS 600 pulled up to the curb. It looked like a spaceship compared to the traffic around it.
The back door opened.
Lee Ji-eun was sitting inside, bathed in the soft ambient light of the luxury cabin. She was reviewing a contract on her tablet, wearing a pair of reading glasses that made her look impossibly elegant.
"You're two minutes late, Chairman," she teased without looking up. "Did the math tutor keep you?"
She looked up, smiling.
The smile died instantly.
The color drained from her face.
She saw the dust on his trousers. She saw the tie yanked loose. And she saw the smear of bright red blood on his white collar.
"Jin!"
It was pure instinct. The "Director" vanished. The "Partner" vanished.
She didn't wait for Chief Jung to open the door. She scrambled across the expansive leather seat, her tablet sliding to the floor, and grabbed his arm, yanking him into the cabin.
"Chief! Go! Now!" she screamed.
The car surged forward, the V8 engine roaring as it merged aggressively into traffic.
The sound-proofed cabin cut off the noise of the city, leaving only the sound of Ji-eun's frantic breathing.
"What happened?" she demanded, her voice trembling. Her hands were all over him—hovering over his face, touching his shoulders, searching for bullet holes or knife wounds. "Who did this? Was it Min-ho? Did he hit you?"
"Just a negotiation," Jin-woo said wearily, leaning his head back against the headrest. He closed his eyes. "It's handled."
"Don't lie to me!" Ji-eun snapped. Her voice cracked. Her eyes were fierce, shining with sudden, terrified tears. "You're bleeding!"
"It's not my blood," Jin-woo said softly.
He opened his eyes and looked at her.
The "Iron Lady" of Apex Investment—the woman who had stared down Chairman Choi and humiliated bankers—was shaking. She looked terrified. Not for her money. Not for the company. But for him.
"Let me see your hands," she ordered. Her voice was barely a whisper.
Jin-woo hesitated. He tried to hide his right hand in his lap.
"Jin."
He held it out.
It was a mess. The knuckles were swollen, purple, and split open. Dried blood crusted the skin.
Ji-eun let out a shaky breath that sounded like a sob. She reached into the center console and pulled out the emergency first-aid kit she kept there.
She took his hand in hers. Her fingers were cool and soft against his battered, hot skin. She started to clean the wounds with an antiseptic wipe. She was agonizingly gentle, treating his hand like it was made of fragile porcelain.
"The Seven Star Gang?" she guessed quietly. She was focusing intensely on the wound, refusing to look at his face.
"Chairman Jang got curious," Jin-woo murmured. He watched her eyelashes flutter. "He thinks he can intimidate us into giving him a percentage of the land deal."
"We have 85 Billion Won in the bank," Ji-eun whispered, her voice tight with suppressed anger. She dabbed at a particularly deep cut. "We live in Hannam The Hill. We have security teams. We have lawyers."
She looked up, her eyes locking onto his. They were dark with emotion.
"Why are you fighting in alleys like a thug?"
"Because if I don't set an example, they won't stop," Jin-woo said. "If I hide behind lawyers, they'll think I'm weak. They'll come for you next. Or Eun-ji."
Ji-eun froze.
He fought to protect the pack.
"You're the Chairman," she argued, but the fire had gone out of her voice, replaced by a desperate plea. "You hire people to do this. You don't... you don't risk your life."
"Ji-eun..."
"If you get hurt... the deal is off," she said, her voice shaking. She squeezed his fingers. "I don't work with corpses. And Eun-ji... she can't lose you. I can't..."
She stopped.
The silence in the car stretched out, thick and heavy.
Jin-woo was looking at her, his gaze intense. Ji-eun was holding his hand in both of hers, her face inches from his. Her thumb was gently, unconsciously stroking the uninjured part of his palm.
It was intimate.
It was far too intimate for a Director and her CEO. It was the touch of a woman who had forgotten her boundaries because she was terrified of losing the man in front of her.
Suddenly, Ji-eun blinked.
She seemed to wake up from a trance. She looked down at their joined hands. She realized she was practically leaning into his space, clutching him like a lifeline.
She gasped.
She let go of his hand as if it were burning hot.
"I—I mean," she stammered, scrambling back to her side of the car. Her face flushed a brilliant, deep crimson. She cleared her throat loudly, straightening her blazer with trembling hands. "I just... we can't have blood on the upholstery. This is a rental. The cleaning fees are exorbitant."
She picked up her fallen tablet, staring pointedly out the window at the passing blurring lights of the Han River.
"Ahem. Yes. Just... protecting the company's primary asset. That's all. It's a fiduciary duty."
Jin-woo watched her panic. He watched the way her ears turned pink.
He looked at his bandaged hand. The pain was still there, but it felt distant now.
A small, tired smile touched his lips.
"Of course, Director," he said softly. "The upholstery is very important."
Ji-eun turned even redder. She stabbed the intercom button.
"Chief Jung," she said, her voice unusually high-pitched. "Take us to Hannam The Hill immediately. The Chairman needs to... change his shirt."
Jin-woo leaned back and closed his eyes, listening to the hum of the engine.
The war for the city had begun. He had drawn first blood. But as he sat there, safe in the quiet luxury of the car, he realized that the most dangerous thing wasn't the gangsters or the Chaebols.
It was the woman sitting next to him, and the fact that for the first time in two lives, he wasn't fighting alone.